Washington St. versus Colorado, Saturday on FOX, was everything we used to watch football for — action, intrigue, a close, well-played game. At 14-14, five minutes left in the half it had our attention. There was even a sense of shifting momentum (Hey kids, before football was afflicted with commercial incontinence, momentum was a regular factor in football games).

That’s when WSU quarterback Luke Falk rolled right and completed an 18-yard pass at the Colorado 11 to Isaiah Johnson-Mack, who curled back toward the sideline. He caught it with both feet — in college only the first foot is needed — clearly in bounds, and WSU hustled toward the new line of scrimmage; it had momentum.

And then the plug was pulled. The referee announced that the play “is under review.” And so for the next two minutes on a just-in-case bad guess — no, a rotten guess — that what once was always a clean, no-gripes catch needed microscopic examination.

The original call stood, a decision FOX then affixed to unintended comedy — a graphic that read, “Replay Confirmed, Player Ejected” — but the game, to some incalculable degree, changed for no reasonable reason, as there are no two moments in time that are the same.

WSU stalled, kicked a field goal to take the lead, but would lose. The game changed for no reason.

Ohio State quarterback J.T. Barrett is tackled after a short gain by Michigan State’s Riley Billough (left) and Andrew Dowell.Getty Images

On ESPN, as Michigan St. was down, late, to Ohio St, 17-10, analyst Todd Blackledge might have simply said that MSU’s defense has played well. But those paid to explain football are often eager to confuse it.

So Blackledge said MSU was playing “improved defense,” followed by, “This was a defense that gave up 54 points to Northwestern.”

No! In that game Northwestern scored on an intercepted pass and a 95-yard kickoff return. MSU’s defense wasn’t good, but good enough to force six Northwestern punts.

This is the state of “expert” analysis. All points allowed are on the defense, all scored belong to the offense. And we can see and know better!

Florida St.-Syracuse on ABC/ESPN — the Syracuse Orange, which has more Nike uniforms than wins, this time wore some orange — often featured players disappearing behind then — surprise! — reappearing from behind ESPN’s score, clock, down/distance box in the lower right.

Now, given live sports TV is supposed to be — and once was — enjoyed as a moving, visual enterprise, as opposed to a reading one, how does one fix this?

With common sense, that’s how! The same info in that obstructive box, if posted horizontally along the top of the screen, would not obstruct the view of the game!

But what chance have we of getting through to a sports network that never tires of demonstrating its foolishness? Saturday, this ESPN news flash appeared: “Upset Alert — Missouri 6, #19 Tennessee 0, 9:06 left first quarter.”

In a remarkable comeback, Tennessee won, 63-37.

FOX coverage has it all – good and bad

Bears quarterback Jay CutlerUPI

Bears versus Giants on FOX — the good, the bad, the ugly, the inexplicable:

Right after kickoff, FOX sent it to sideliner Pam Oliver, who reported Bears QB Jay Cutler had four turnovers, last week — a FOX graphic then showed it to be three — but in talking with the Giants she discovered that they’re expecting Cutler to play better, this day.

In our often-wretched lives, this is known as an absurd waste of time and attention.

En route to commercial break following the game’s first score — a Bears’ TD — FOX and Kevin Burkhardt performed a strong, significant show and tell: Giant Olivier Vernon’s roughing the passer penalty — he tried to injure Cutler rather than just tackle him — was a decision for which the Giants paid.

After a Giants first down at Chicago’s 2-yard line, we saw Eli Manning calling for a hurry-up. Still, FOX cut to a replay of the previous play, thus missing half of the next one — a touchdown. Why not just instantly bust the replay, show it later?

That TD, the second this season easily scored by running back Rashad Jennings from inside the 2 behind good blocking, again was followed by an all-about-me dance by Jennings. Pathetic. Still, it was later featured in slo-mo as one of FOX’s game highlights.

And on a windy day and with :07 left in the half, why would Giants’ punt-returner Dwayne Harris make a fair catch at his own 11? Why risk a fumble at such a time in such a place? Just let it go. What were the Giants and Harris thinking? Despite his otherwise endless talking, analyst John Lynch said nothing.

Moss saga takes a strange turn

Retired former 49ers wide receiver Randy MossAP

Some strange stories don’t make their way to these parts.

Thomas More is a Division III college, enrollment 1,900, in Crestview Hills, Ky., near Cincinnati.
With the considerable help of three-time Division III Player of the Year Sydney Moss, a transfer from Division I Florida, Thomas More became a women’s basketball powerhouse, undefeated the last two seasons.

But last week the NCAA nailed the school, and hard, stripping its wins and a national title for violating rules by allowing a former assistant coach to house Moss, rent-free, for eight months, including those during which she recovered from knee surgery.

What might seem, on its surface, a case of the NCAA overdoing it by punishing a school, a team and a kid for an act of genuine kindness — perhaps she’s broke — has a curious additive.

Moss’s mother, Libby Offutt, lives in West Virginia. She’s reportedly far closer to her mother than her father, former NFL superstar and now ESPN analyst Randy Moss, once estimated to have a net worth of $62 million.

The dictates of modern, long-form football announcer-speak are such that you no longer call a play, you “dial it up.”

What do you suppose is more upsetting to Baylor boosters? The fact that 17 women are alleging that they were victims of violence, sexual assaults and gang rape by 19 recent Baylor football players, or that Baylor, which began 6-0, after losing at home to Kansas State on ESPN2, is now 6-4?

The beauty of Twitter is that it allows so many athletes and sports-attached “celebrities” — vulgar Kate Upton, last week — to show the world there’s little-to-nothing beneath their dignity. To think the antisocial are so drawn to “social media.”